The present invention relates to a novel organopolysiloxane compound having a reactive group bonded to the silicon atom only at one of the molecular chain ends. More particularly, the invention relates to such a novel organopolysiloxane compound useful as a modifying agent of various kinds of synthetic resins by utilizing the reaction with the reactive group at the molecular chain end of the organopolysiloxane. The invention also relates to a method for the preparation of such a novel organopolysiloxane compound.
There are known various organopolysiloxane compounds having a hydroxy-functional or amino-functional substituent group bonded to the silicon atom in the molecule. In the organopolysiloxane compounds of this type known in the prior art, the hydroxy- or amino-functional reactive groups are bonded to both of the terminal silicon atoms in the molecular chain or to the silicon atoms at random positions in the molecular chain excepting the terminal ones.
Such a reactive organopolysiloxane compound is reactive at the amino- or hydroxy-functional reactive groups with various kinds of monomeric compounds having an acid anhydride structure, carboxyl group, isocyanato group, epoxy group and the like in the molecule, from which polyimide resins, polyamide resins, polyurethane resins, epoxy resins and the like are prepared, and is widely used as a modifying agent of these synthetic resins which introduces the organopolysiloxane structure into the synthetic resin thereby to improve the characteristics of the resin such as thermal properties, interfacial properties, gas permeability and the like inherently characteristic in organopolysiloxanes.
The attempt of modification of a synthetic resin by using the above mentioned reactive organopolysiloxane compound sometimes encounters a serious problem as a consequence of the fact that the organopolysiloxane compound has a plural number of the reactive groups bonded to the silicon atoms in a molecule, especially, when the organopolysiloxane has three or more of the reactive groups in a molecule since such a compound acts as a crosslinking agent to cause gelation of the polymer to be modified therewith in addition to the relatively low effect of modification of synthetic resins even by setting aside the problem that this technique of modification is applicable to limited kinds of synthetic resins. Therefore, it is eagerly desired to develop a novel reactive organopolysiloxane compound which can be used in the modification reaction of synthetic resins without the above described problems and disadvantages in the reactive organopolysiloxane compounds in the prior art.